Resolution
by dog.spartacus
Summary: A beginning of the end to the UST.   And very little else.
1. Awake

A/N: This is my first attempt at "adult content" (more developing in later chapters). Please bear that in mind as you read. I love helpful reviews.

Timeframe: Roughly Season 12-ish, but assumes Elliot and Kathy are divorced

And here, the obligatory disclaimer: these characters are _so_ not mine.

* * *

"Resolution"

She wakens slowly. She can't remember the last time it happened so gradually, so calmly. The first thing she's aware of is a lack of pain: her jaw is unclenched, her chest is relaxed, her hips and knees open and comfortable. She credits those last ones to the pillow she has pulled under her left arm and leg. For once, she hasn't simply curled and collapsed into herself on her side. The tension is gone from her body, and all she can think about is how rested she feels for the first time in a very long time, and she wonders if this is how normal people wake up all the time.

Cool air hits her bare back, but she won't open her eyes because she doesn't want to admit that she's awake yet. There's a part of her that criticizes herself for being selfish—for having such a good thing and refusing to give it up—but she just doesn't want to know what time it is or how long (or how short) she's been asleep or if the sun is up or whether she missed a call while she was so deeply asleep. This rest has been long-needed, and she smiles sleepily to herself as she finally concludes, _And I deserve it, damnit_.

She snuggles closer to the support pillow and damn it smells good. The truth is, she's never been much of a sleeper, and as surprised as she is to be so comfortable in her own bed right now, she's even more surprised to discover how familiar everything feels and smells. She burrows her face into the side of the pillow to inhale its scent as her arm tightens its grip, and suddenly her hips rock once against it as if she wished it were a man. She laughs at herself, though not out loud, and rolls over to change sides, pulling the pillow with her.

Only, the pillow doesn't move.

Finally her eyes flutter open in dozy confusion. She eyes the grey cotton pillowcase suspiciously and watches her own hand as it drags across the surface. Again she tries moving it, and when it doesn't budge a second time, the realizations slam painfully throughout her body as she bolts upright: oh-shit-it's-not-a-pillow-it's-my-partner-holy-shit-I'm-shirtless-am-I-naked-no-thank-god-but-holy-shit-it's-not-a-pillow-holy-shit-it's-not-a-pillow. She clutches the sheet to her chest and faces away from him. There is sunlight peeking under the bottom edge of the heavy curtains on the other side of the room, and the alarm clock reads 7:14. She tries to steady her breathing. So much for slow and stress-less waking.

He watches her. He's been awake for a while, waiting for this inevitable moment when she would wake up and the tenderness of sleep would end. It takes everything he has not to reach out and run his palm along the smooth skin of her back. He would mean it as a comfort, of course, as a reassurance that she was okay, that _they_ were okay, but he knows the gesture would not come across that way. She would consider it an invasion of her privacy, especially given how violently she had startled awake in his arms. Because they don't _touch_ that way. Hell, they don't touch at all. The fact that she rolled onto him during the night—even the fact that she let him stay the night in her bed—was such an intimate experience that he doesn't want to invalidate it by pissing her off right now.

But he's an asshole anyway because he knows how much she must trust him to let him stay, and he can see her vulnerability, and—god damn him—he's hard in spite of it. He tries to rationalize and tell himself that it's a body's natural physiological reaction to someone else's proximity at this hour, but he knows the truth: it's for her. He's hard for her, and he hates himself for it.

Finally he rolls onto his left side, facing her, and speaks. "You okay?" he asks quietly.

"Where's my shirt?" she grits, as if it's his fault it's missing.

"Uh, around five o'clock you sat up, sweating, and uh, you tossed it somewhere," he responds. She can't believe how soft his voice is. He thinks about assuring her that he didn't see anything, which is almost the truth, but then decides it's likely to make her feel even more exposed, so he remains quiet.

She throws herself back down with a sigh, hands still clutching the sheet, relieved to have some of the pieces filled in. "Guess I'm not used to sharing a bed," she snorts wryly.

"You, uh, want me to find it? Or get you another one?" he offers tentatively, hoping against hope that she'll say no for some reason—because if he gets out of bed right now, if she catches sight of him in profile, she'll _know_.

She sighs up to the ceiling again. "What's the point now?" she wonders aloud and he breathes a little easier. "All I really want to do is go back to sleep and forget I just woke up."

He chuckles but won't confess how glad he is that she had finally gotten some decent rest—and that she wanted more of it. "Well, we've got until two at least," he says, closing his eyes as he finds a comfortable position on his left side.

She smiles next to him, and this is not at all anything they're used to, but it's surprisingly easy, and she loves that he's still here. She loves that he said "we" as if it were any other morning, as if this were the most natural thing in the world, as if he had no intention of going anywhere because there was absolutely nothing unusual about the two of them in bed together. Then the unthinkable happens: she innocently draws her right leg up to tuck her ankle under her other leg, and her knee collides with physiology.

They both freeze.

"El?" she breathes.

"Sorry," he huffs and flips immediately onto his back. He can't look at her right now. He swallows hard as he fumbles for words. "Do you, um, want me to go? I—I can go." He's already pulling the blanket aside so he can slide out when she surprises him for the fifth time in as many hours.

"No, it's okay," she tells him quietly. "You can stay—if you want."

He pauses at the edge of the bed, blanket still raised. "What do _you_ want?" he asks.

It takes her a while to respond, but he will wait until she does—wait to hear whether he has broken this tenuous thing between them, or whether she still trusts him, aroused as he is. She won't look at him as she finally admits: "I don't think I'll sleep as well if you're gone." They both know that means she won't even try. They both know that if he leaves now, she'll get up for the day, probably go for a long run, hit the gym, show up at the precinct well before she's due. She'll forget to eat, even though the hectic pace of the day will be entirely her own doing. In the end, she'll have exhausted herself before the real work has even begun—and for no good reason. She's never done "downtime" very well.

He looks back at her, almost gazes. "I'll stay," he assures her and climbs back to his former position. He lies down again on his back, and the two lie there side by side for what feels like hours.

Pieces of the night before come back to her as she lies there, completely wound up again and unable to relax. They had closed their last case just after midnight and hadn't left the precinct in nearly three days. It was Elliot who insisted on finishing all the paperwork that night, and Cragen had grudgingly let them, warning them that he'd better not see them for at least twelve hours after they left. "I've got enough problems with the officers' overtime this month, I don't need heat from the brass about you guys too," he'd said.

They finished up shortly after two, and Elliot had the sedan so he offered to drive Olivia home. When they pulled up to her building, there was a gap out front long enough for them, so she said, "Why don't you park and come have a drink? I sure could use one." He had grinned, saying, "Last call's not for another hour." She had rolled her eyes. "Yeah, well, this one's on me," she told him. So he had parked the car and they'd walked up to her apartment together.

Once inside, she had poured them both whiskeys and given him a beer chaser to tide him over while she showered quickly and put on fresh clothes. When she returned to her living room, barely ten minutes later, he was asleep on the couch with his beer half-finished in his hand. Unwilling to wake him and sure he had only nodded off, she flopped down in the armchair next to the sofa to await his awakening.

It was she who was wakened, however, sometime later—maybe forty minutes—when his hands wrapped around her upper arms and he coaxed her from the chair. "Come on," she now remembers him whispering, "no way you're sleeping out here." He practically carried her back to her bedroom, and she imagines she could sense his surprise at how immaculate her bedroom was. But he should have known, seeing the blanket and the rumpled upholstery on the sofa, that she didn't spend much time near her bed. But she remembers him pausing in the doorway, and now she interprets that as surprise, disappointment. Maybe anger.

He deposited her onto the edge of the bed, saying, "Go back to sleep. You've got a good ten hours still."

When he started to retreat, she gripped his forearms. "Don't go," she whispered.

"Liv—" he protested.

"No, just—please. Not yet."

He let out a pitiful grunt. "Liv, I'm tired," he nearly whined.

She let out a massive yawn and then patted the bedspread behind her. "Sleep here," she said simply.

"Liv," he warned her.

"Elliot," she reasoned, "you passed out on my couch as soon as you sat down. You shouldn't be driving right now."

He glared at her for a moment. "Fine," he finally growled. "I'll take the couch." He started for the door but stopped when he heard her voice.

"El," came her defeated protest. He turned to face her and she looked him dead in the eye. _Please_, was on the tip of her tongue and made its way into her gaze. "Come on," she breathed instead. She didn't need to tell him that she couldn't be by herself right now or that it was his presence alone that made her feel safe enough to let herself succumb to sleep; he already knew, and she knew he knew.

He had stared her down for a moment before finally relenting. "Okay," he huffed as he dropped his gaze to the floor. Who was he to deny her? Even on their worst days, he would sacrifice almost anything for her. No, their partnership wasn't unhealthy at all, and the fact that he was about to get into bed with her wasn't at all dangerous or stupid. He stalked around to the other side of the bed as she began pulling down the bedspread from her side. "I don't have anything to sleep in," he told her, as if he thought that might change her mind.

"We're both adults, we'll be fine," she said grumpily as she threw herself into bed. Part of her wanted to joke, "Just don't tell Cap," but she knew that wouldn't exactly make the night any easier. Rather, it would only draw attention to the fact that they really were about to get into bed together—and not because they were undercover on a case, not because someone up top only booked one hotel room at a conference, not because it was some last-ditch effort to stave off frostbite or hypothermia or any other if-we-don't-share-body-heat-right-now-we're-going-to-die disease, but because she asked him to. And, despite how many times her mind had drifted to fantasies much like this, it terrified her to learn how simple it really was to get him into bed with her: all she had to do was ask. Not that that's what this was, of course, she had been quick to remind herself. He was her partner, they were exhausted, this was practical. This wasn't the sexiest man she knew finally getting into bed with her after twelve years of foreplay. This wasn't that. It wasn't. He was her partner, they were exhausted, this was practical. She didn't want him. He was her partner; this was practical. He was just her partner. And he didn't want her.

Behind her she could hear him hesitantly pulling his clothes off, and she lay there, facing away from him, hyper-aware of every clink of metal and rasp of fabric against skin. By the time he nervously slid into the bed next to her, wearing only his grey t-shirt and black boxer briefs, she felt so awake that she couldn't imagine ever falling sleep again—for the rest of her life.

"Well, goodnight," he had said, the discomfort evident in his voice.

"Night," she had replied, hoping she sounded even remotely sleepy.

And then they had lain there, much as they were lying now, with an awkward and unnamed tension between them. Finally the stress of her hyper-vigilance must have worn her out, because before her clock read four a.m., she was asleep again. And within three hours, her arm was resting on his chest and her leg was draped over his.

As they lie there now in the dusk-like darkness of her bedroom, she fights the urge to roll over and resume her former position. Part of her doesn't believe she'll be able to fall back asleep otherwise. The other part of her doesn't believe how suddenly clingy she's become.

She supposes she ought to ask for his permission before she does it, but she doesn't know how. _Excuse me, Elliot, may I please sleep on you?_ How exactly does one say that? Instead she rolls over onto her side to face him, still clutching her sheet. She watches him as he stares at the ceiling, and he no longer looks relaxed or comfortable by any stretch of the mind. Even as she speaks, she's aware that she might be about to push him so far beyond his comfort zone that they'll never recover. But she can't stop herself. She needs it. "El?" she asks softly.

His head turns to her. "Yeah?"

She takes a breath and props herself up on her elbow. "Do you think I could, uh..." she begins. She bites her bottom lip, stares at his chest, and tries again: "Would it be okay if, um..." She can't finish it, so she hopes he can read the rest of her question in her eyes when she looks up at him.

He does, and the terror in his eyes is not lost on her. "Sure," comes his high-pitched reply. They're both frozen for a moment, and then he moves his hands from where they'd been resting on his abdomen and links them together under his head, granting her access to his chest. She slides closer, and his voice is very low when he asks, "Are you sure you don't want me to get you a shirt?"

She surprises them both when she whispers, "I don't want you to go anywhere." And then her left forearm finds a home along his sternum and she relaxes against his side. He tries hard not to think about how close she is or how perfectly she fits alongside him or the fact that there's only a thin sheet covering her bare chest, now pressed snugly against his ribs. _No thinner than a t-shirt_, he tries to tell himself. _No thinner than a t-shirt_. But his body isn't listening, only reacting to her closeness and the gentleness of her touch, and he is losing the battle to control the tightness in his groin.

Her head rests on his left bicep and her hair smells like juniper, and he knows he's fucked. He was damned if he did and damned if he didn't from the moment he offered her that ride home last night—and so was their partnership.

If he had simply dropped her off and gone on to a bar by himself, he would have been rejecting the olive branch she was offering, consequently discarding the partnership. By accepting her offer, he had completely set himself up for the rest of the night's events. When she asked him to stay, he could have said no. He could have hammered the final nail into the coffin and confirmed for her that their partnership could not be resuscitated at this point; it included neither friendship nor preference, and he would never even consider extending himself on her behalf, instead always choosing something else before he thought about her. Sure, he could have accepted her vulnerability and stomped mercilessly on it. By getting into the bed, he absolutely shattered their professional distance, and thereby risked not only their partnership but also their careers. This morning, he could have insisted on leaving. He could have abandoned her when she needed him most, violating her trust and leaving her to question his commitment. Instead, he obliterated any remaining shards from last night's shattering of professionalism and was now playing with fire as he permitted his topless female partner to nestle into his side. Yes, he understands, he is well and truly fucked. And so is any hope for a healthy partnership after this.

It's as if she's aware of his thinking when she raises her head slightly and heaves a sigh that he can feel in his own lungs. "I'm sorry," she murmurs. She pauses and doesn't know how to continue.

When Elliot was married, he participated in a lot of conversations that he later realized Kathy had already scripted for the two of them. A cynical part of him wonders now if Olivia is waiting for him to prompt her, but when she's silent for too long, he asks anyway: "For what?" His voice is gruff but tender.

When she shrugs, he knows she wasn't baiting him after all, and every muscle in his body aches from wanting to reassure her somehow. She takes another deep breath. "For everything," she says because she thinks he's expecting an answer, and it's the only one she's got. "For _this_," she suddenly continues. "For being so... needy. For asking you to stay, for forcing myself—"

"Sh-shh, hey," he's cooing before she can finish the thought. "Hey, no. No-no." His right hand cradles her head to his chest, his thumb gently stroking her cheek. As soon as he does it, he realizes he's given himself away—because they don't _do_ this, they don't _touch_ this way—but, for the life of him, he can't let her go. "It's okay," he whispers into her hair, and his lips are so close that it wouldn't take any effort at all to kiss the top of her head.

She raises her head a little to look at him, narrowing her eyes as she tries to process what else it could mean to have his thumb on her cheek and his lips in her hair. For once his face is completely open, and it tells her that his actions can't mean anything other than what they do. Now that it's out there, he is unapologetic in this admission, and for the first time ever, she lets herself believe that she hadn't just been imagining everything for the last twelve years.

He is emboldened when she drops her head to his chest again, accepting everything he was offering in that silent exchange. Leaving her face, his hand finds hers where it rests on his chest. As his fingers caress hers, the tension leaves his body and he sighs deeply, relaxing into the mattress. Sleep threatens to overtake him again, and he is a willing victim to it. He sleepily removes his left hand from behind his head, and Olivia shifts to accommodate the motion. His hand comes to rest on her bare shoulder, and it has such a warm, calming effect on her that she nearly falls asleep right then. A moment later Elliot's hand trails down her side all the way to her hip, then back to the dip of her waist. He establishes a secure hold and barely has time to revel in the recognition that he's holding his goddamn partner—and she's letting him—before he succumbs again to sleep. The smile on his face is faint but unmistakable.

* * *

Two hours later, he stirs awake to a steady movement across his abdomen and up his torso: a lazy up and down, a gentle back and forth. At first it has a lulling effect, as it might in any other situation, and he nearly falls back asleep as his body reacts involuntarily to the soothing contact. It is peaceful and quiet, and he's trying to remember the last time he awoke feeling so content when the peace suddenly drains from him and rigid panic sets in. His body tenses with the memory of where he is, and his eyes shoot open to confirm that nope, he's not in his own bedroom, and yep, that's Olivia Benson's hand rambling over the cotton-clad contours of his chest. He shivers out of want as her palm skids under his navel, and he tries like hell to get himself under control.

It's too much, though, when she drags her left leg over his and uses the leverage to pull her hips against him. "God, Liv," he groans, and his embarrassed laugh comes out as a strangled chuckle as he tries to decide between grabbing her shoulders to shake her awake or not to risk touching her at all. "You gotta—_Jesus_," he hisses as she rocks against him again, "—aw, you _gotta_ wake up, Liv." Her left knee is tucked between his legs, and there's very little—a slight shift up and to the left or a sudden leg spasm—keeping the decorum between them. "You're killin' me, babe," he breathes at the very bottom of his register, finishing the thought with an ardent, guttural plea: "Come on, wake up!"

Her hand suddenly stills. "I'm awake," she says simply.

He shifts, trying to sit up. "What?" he rasps.

She's still clinging to him, eyes open but unwilling to meet his gaze. There is only the briefest of pauses before she deliberately draws her left knee up further and rolls to straddle his left hip. His lingering erection presses into her thigh and she finally raises her eyes to his. "I'm awake," she repeats simply.

As she stares him down, she knows no fear. No matter what she tried to tell herself the night before—that he was just her partner, that she didn't want him, that he didn't want her—this morning has convinced her that none of it's true, and, she concedes, it probably never has been.

His mouth hangs open. _What the fuck is she doing_. It's not a question; his brain can't form questions. And even if he had the power of speech in this moment, he wouldn't be able to master inflection.

She braces herself on her forearms, one on either side of him, then slides down his body slowly before quickly bucking her pelvis upward against his thigh. They only break eye contact when his eyes roll back in his head from the action. He growls as he tries to focus his vision again. When he catches sight of her face, she wears a smug look of satisfaction, and it only makes him angrier—and harder. The additional glint of mischief in her eye is almost enough to make him throw caution to the wind, flip her onto her back, and take her right there. That's what Primal Elliot wants to do. She arches an eyebrow and starts inching down his body again, and Primal Elliot's mind begins calculating the force it'll take to flip her and which article of clothing will need to come off first.

But then Rational Elliot shows up. Cop Elliot. Partner Elliot. Party over.

The fire is gone from his gaze as he lightly grips her upper arms. "What are we doing?" he asks quietly, sadly. _We_, not _you_. It's a serious thing they've started, and it could be the ruin of them both.

She stops instantly and rolls off of him, flopping onto her back next to him. Feeling rejected, embarrassed, and ashamed, she drapes an arm over her eyes to hide from him.

"I'm not saying I don't want this," he's quick to say, turning immediately towards her. "I just think we ought to talk about it first—"

"Yeah, because you're so damn great at talking," she sneers, rolling away and into a standing position in one smooth motion. He watches her walk towards the bathroom, and he wishes there weren't so much finality in her strut. She stoops near the foot of the bed to pick up her discarded t-shirt, and it's on before she hits the bathroom door, and he's got a sick feeling in his gut that he's missed his only chance. When the door latches closed behind her, he glances at the clock. _Time of death, 9:23 AM_. There could be no resuscitating their partnership—or anything else—after this. He is sure of it.


	2. Open

It's twenty minutes before she emerges. He has heard everything from his place across the room and thinks it's probably a bad sign that she has showered again. The time away from her has given him a chance to calm himself down, but it hasn't helped that he can hear the moan of the pipes or every sluicing sheet of water as it crashes against the tile and porcelain. He's keenly aware of the moment her shower ends, and he's sitting forward in the bed, waiting for the instant the door opens.

"Hey," he offers when she steps out, toweling her hair.

She pauses only briefly when she sees him. "You're still here?" she tosses, not even waiting for a response before she stalks through the door and down the hall.

He's quick to follow her, nearly somersaulting out of bed, and he has his pants on—is buckling his belt—when he catches up to her in the kitchen.

"For the record," she snarls, not needing to look up to know he's there as she removes a carton of orange juice from the fridge, "I didn't invite you in last night just so we could fuck."

He's taken aback by her language and her sudden attitude, and he reacts to her statement as if someone has just thrown sand in his face. "I didn't think you did," he contends quietly.

Finally she looks at him—_glares_ at him—then breaks away. She has deliberately pulled one glass out of the cabinet and now fills it with juice. "You should head home, El. Grab a shower, change of clothes. Freshen up before work." Her tone is forcedly sweet. She takes a sip of her juice. "You could probably even catch another hour or two of shut-eye." She looks at him and smiles, waiting for him to cave.

Elliot smiles back, reaches forward over the open bar, lifts her glass of orange juice, and has a swallow. "I'm good, thanks," he says, mimicking her saccharine tone.

"God, what's your problem?" she snaps, reverting instantly to her previous irritation.

"_My_ problem?" Elliot suddenly explodes, and he's never before fought this way with Olivia outside the bullpen, and even then it was never this personal. "You're pissed at me, but I didn't do a single thing _you_ didn't _ask_ me to do!" _Except get aroused_, his mind screams at him, but he'd be an idiot to bring that up right now.

"So it's _my_ fault," she concludes incredulously. "You know what, of course it is—it's always something I've done to you, always some way _I've_ made you feel. Something _I've_ incited you to do. Because, why, you're incapable of independent thought? Can't do anything unless someone else tells you to? Huh? Always reacting, never doing anything on your own. That's what you do."

"Hey, _you_ got out of the bed."

She reels around on him. "Excuse me?"

He just stares at her. The fire is back in his eyes. Elliot can't believe he's about to say what he's about to say, but it needs being said. He lowers his voice and speaks as calmly as he can manage: "Why are you mad at _me_, when _you're_ the one who got out of the bed?"

She's about to break and couldn't bear it if he saw. The truth is, she's mad because it's her defense. It's her go-to emotion for when things hit dangerously close to a nerve. Back there, in bed, two hours ago, she thought Elliot wanted her. Thirty minutes ago, she opened up and let him see she wanted him, too. And then... he rejected her. So instead of crying about it—which, to be honest, part of her wants to do—she's gotten angry. She turns away and he can barely hear her when she says, "No, sorry, we're not having this conversation."

He's about to continue the fight and ask her what conversation they _were_ allowed to have, since they couldn't talk about having sex and now they can't talk about _not_ having sex, when it suddenly dawns on him why she's angry. He understands because he does it, too: instead of having an appropriate emotional response to something that upsets him, he lashes out in anger. It makes him sick to realize that he has hurt her in a moment when he most wanted to show her how much he cared, and he's got to make it up to her somehow. Slowly he circles around to the doorway of the kitchen to block any escape she might attempt. "Thing is," he says softly, "I'm not just a quick lay."

"That's self-flattery if I ever heard it," she snorts, steamrolling over his sincerity.

"That's not what I mean," he grates. She looks up and is surprised to find him where he is. "We _are _going to talk about this," he says simply, "because when it happens—"

"_When_?" she echoes indignantly.

"Olivia, you can't tell me you haven't thought about it," he challenges quickly. He lets that sit with her for a moment before continuing his original train of thought. "When it happens—and it will—it's going to mean something. And I just want us to be on the same page when the time comes. That's all."

She stands on the opposite side of the room from him, as far away as she can get. Narrowing her eyes, she inspects him from afar, as if trying to determine how serious he's being. Could her partner really be implying what she thinks he is? Could Elliot Stabler actually be asking her to have an open conversation with him about their feelings? Is Mr. Not-Just-A-Quick-Lay really standing in front of her, suggesting that they could start some kind of meaningful, potentially long-term, relationship? Was that _really_ what was happening in her kitchen this morning? When her scrutinizing gaze meets his, she recognizes the same look in his eye that was there when he stopped her in the bedroom. And damnit does she want to kick herself: yes, the fire was gone, but the heat sure wasn't, and if he wants her at all in this moment, he sure as hell wanted her then. She just hadn't noticed. As it turns out, there was nothing of rejection in that moment. Her knees fail her and she clutches the counter behind her for support.

Elliot advances.

Never in twelve years has he scared her as much as he does right now.

It's only a few steps he's taken, and now he rests against the countertop beside the fridge, still giving her space. He crosses his arms. "So?" he finally asks.

She wonders if she looks as terrified as she feels. Her heart is racing, and when she tries to swallow, she has to concentrate just to press her lips together. She's not sure how long her mouth has been hanging open.

His confidence seems to come so naturally, but the truth is, he has never been in this situation before—with anyone. When he and Kathy were dating in high school, they had explicitly defined themselves as a couple before they ever fooled around for the first time. With the women he had been with since Kathy, there were similarly clear expectations and mutual understandings of what they were doing and where things were headed. He had never had to _discuss_ anything in the middle of its happening, nor had the nature of a relationship ever been so murky, even with Dani.

For some reason, Elliot had always assumed—and especially since his divorce—that the time would come when he and Olivia would sleep together. (Because, after all, clichés and stereotypes have to come from somewhere, right?) He had known it, almost from the moment he met her, that she was going to be trouble—both for him and his marriage. That's part of why he worked so damn hard to keep things professional, part of why he got so angry when he realized he cared about her more profoundly than a partner should. So he had always assumed that the awkward "morning after" would one day come, too. What he had never counted on was the plain awkward _morning_... before which nothing had actually happened.

He shifts his weight and stares at her, waiting.

"Elliot, we're partners," she says at last, looking away from him in exasperation.

"I know that." Suddenly he stands up straight, no longer leaning on anything, hands now on his hips. "But I also know that something happened in there. Something that's been building up for years. The whole time we've known each other. And I know that... we owe it to ourselves—" and he falters, then, because he's not really sure that he deserves her at all, and he can't think of anything he's done recently which merits a reward. But he wants her too much, and he continues: "We owe it to ourselves... to see it through."

She rolls her eyes for his benefit. "There is so much wrong with what you just said."

"There's so much wrong with our partnership," he counters with a laugh, and when she looks up, he is slowly closing the distance between them.

"Sleeping together is not going to fix that," she responds firmly.

He sidles up next to her. "You sure about that?" he drops into her ear.

No, damnit, she's not sure at all! It takes every bit of willpower she has to keep from falling forward into him. "Elliot," she musters, "we're talking about careers, reputations... are you really willing to throw it all away for..." She can't finish.

"For you?" he guesses, taking a small step forward.

"For one... stupid indiscretion," she corrects.

"Liv, that's what I'm saying, it's not—" he stops to exhale gruffly, unsure of how to make her understand, how to tell her what he needs her to know. "It's more than that. For me, it's more than that. It's not some mistake, it's not stupid, it's... not a one-time thing. I'm not... I'm not a one-and-done," he heaves. "Not with you. And yeah, if it would cost me my job to prove it to you, I'd do it."

"Elliot—"

"In a heartbeat."

"Elliot!"

"Look, I couldn't give up the job for Kathy, but now..."

"Stop," Olivia pleads.

"No: I couldn't do it then because it would have meant giving you up, too. I just couldn't do that. And now... well, for _this_, I could stand to lose it, because I'd still have you."

"That's crazy," she breathes, shutting her eyes against the idea of ever seeing anyone else at the desk across from hers.

"Listen to me," he rushes, afraid he won't be able to say it. "I've loved six women in my entire life. Okay?" He holds up one hand and counts off each one as he names them. "I loved my mother, I loved my wife, I love my daughters." His hand is full, and he takes a breath, staring directly at Olivia. "And I love you."

She laughs, wishing for the sake of their partnership that he were joking, and deflects him: "Yeah, like a brother loves a sister, like Fin loves Munch, like you might learn to play the bagpipes just so you could lead my funeral march—"

"No," he interjects calmly, "like I wouldn't leave last night because I was too worried you wouldn't actually sleep, like I was relieved to see that you had orange juice in your fridge this morning, like I worry about you. And I think about you when I shouldn't. I think _things_ about you that I shouldn't. And it eats me up to see you with other men. And I lie awake at night wishing things were different."

She blanches and wishes she could tell him how many times she went jogging late at night when she couldn't sleep and hovered outside his building, looking for any kind of light in the window that would tell her it would be okay to call him, even at three o'clock, four o'clock, in the morning. She never saw a light but wonders now if he was awake all the same.

He places his hand on top of hers on the countertop, grazing her skin lightly with his thumb. "Last night was... the best night I've had in a really long time. I need you to know that. I want this. I have for... a long time. But if we decide to end this now... that's okay. Because at least there was last night."

She's not sure what it is that propels her forward: his confession that the night meant as much to him as it had to her, his willingness to share the responsibility for ending whatever it was they might have started, or just her overwhelming need for him. But _something_ sends her forward against him, and her lips touch his lightly, simply resting against them at first.

He is frozen. So is she.

It is she who moves first, ever so slightly, so that her lips part and then close around his top one. He responds, just as timidly, pulling her bottom lip between his. Both release their holds and the action is repeated. His hand still covers hers on the countertop, and she can't help the sense of disappointment she feels at how tame everything is. She had always suspected that when Elliot Stabler finally got his lips on hers—because, somewhere deep down, she too had always known this was bound to happen—he would be much more aggressive and bold, and she would come away flushed and bruised. Screw the Catholic schoolboy charm and twenty-five years of monogamy; Olivia was well-acquainted with his temper and had always believed that it would translate into a similar, if not greater, passion in the bedroom.

Just as she's about to admit to herself that her assumptions were faulty, he sucks her bottom lip farther into his mouth and nips her with his teeth. Her mouth and eyes open at the same time and she pulls back. He catches her eye and she sees the predatory dilation of his pupils. Suddenly he's on her again, one hand slipping behind her neck to hold her in place while his lips crush against hers and his tongue slips between her parted lips.

She whimpers into his mouth, lifting both of her hands to his chest now. The sound elicits a growl from him, and one hand is tangled in the hair at the nape of her neck while his other draws her closer with pressure on her lower back. Her hands slide from his chest to his face and he is biting her lips and nothing has ever felt so good.

She nips back in response and rakes her fingers across his scalp. Her pelvis presses against him, eager and insistent, and he can't suppress his cocky chuckle when he briefly pulls away to take a breath. She hasn't let him get enough air when she goes for him again, and this time it's her mouth hot on his, her teeth scraping against his flesh, her tongue prying his lips apart.

She strides forward, and he stumbles backward in an effort to keep up. He collides with the counters and cabinets behind him with some force, and Olivia keeps pushing. He can't tell if he's hard again or if he never really recovered from earlier in the morning, but he wants her. Desperately. And he knows she knows it because now that she's got him pinned in place, she won't stop grinding against him.

He's certain he knows the answer before he asks, but the gentleman (or the sex crimes cop) in him won't go any further without a response: "Are you okay with this?" he asks huskily when she releases his lips to focus on a spot just below his jaw.

She draws back, and the sight of her is something he knows he'll never forget. Her lips are swollen, the skin around them red and full, her damp hair is tousled, her eyes are wide and dark, and the towel she'd had around her shoulders—which he doesn't remember disappearing—is on the floor on the other side of the kitchen. She holds his gaze for a moment and then, in response to his question, she reaches forward and yanks on the clasp of his belt.

He grunts when she does it and this is so close to perfect but he needs to be sure. "Say it," he whispers.

Suddenly she smiles because she has just learned that in the midst of passion—of possessiveness and aggressiveness—he can be considerate. Still holding the front of his belt, she tugs him forward and presses her forehead to his. "Yes," she says, her smile only growing, "I'm very okay with this."

He laughs because she's smiling and because he likes her reply, and then she presses forward and kisses him sweetly.

Her hands belie the tenderness of the kiss, though, as they deftly begin work on his belt buckle. One hand slides down inside the front of his pants before she even has them unbuttoned. Her thumb hooks into the waistband of his boxer briefs while her fingers fan over him through the fabric.

His hands have dropped to her hips, and now his thumbs work their way under her t-shirt to graze the bare flesh there. Gradually his fingers follow and soon he grips her waist, his fingers splaying across the small of her back while his thumbs stroke the taut muscles of her abdomen. Even though they've had the conversation—or enough guttural questions and choked responses to represent one—he still can't believe that he's permitted to do this. Never before has he ever been allowed to touch her this much, this intimately, with so much bare skin sliding over so much bare skin, and neither of them shirking away. And these are only his hands, he reminds himself with a grin as he imagines what's yet to come.

His lips slide across her jaw to her neck, searing her flesh. She didn't think anything could burn her as much as his palms were as they roamed her torso, and she never knew anything could feel so hot against skin already so feverish from want, but there are his lips, more scorching than his hands. She knows, even if he doesn't linger, she'll have reminders tomorrow of where his mouth has been today. Elliot, meanwhile, imagines that touching her is like what grabbing a live coal must feel like: so impossibly hot, so wrong, but you can't let it go because by the time you realize you ought to drop it, it's already burned into your flesh like a brand. He's sure he'll have blisters all over his body later; if nothing else, God knows he'll be ruined for any other woman after this.

* * *

She steps back unexpectedly and swiftly rids herself of her shirt. Elliot's eyes darken even more as he takes in the sight. He lunges for her before she has a chance to remove anything else, his mouth on her collarbone and his hot palm cupping one of her breasts. Within moments his mouth has replaced his hand on her breast, and with the way his tongue is working, Olivia fleetingly thinks of Kathy and five kids and she can't blame the woman at all for wanting to hold onto a man this gifted. But enough ruminating: she needs her hands on him. She needs her _mouth_ on him. Now. Olivia takes his face in her hands and pulls him back up to her, hungrily capturing his lips with hers.

Her hands drop immediately to his pants, unbuttoning them and unzipping the fly, shoving them down over the curve of his ass, not even bothering to remove his belt from its loops. He steps out of them as they slide down, and she reaches into his boxer briefs so she can feel his skin on hers.

He groans at the contact, thrusting into her hand in spite of himself, and she chuckles into his mouth as she kisses him. With her other hand, she tugs her own loose pants down over her hips and lets them drop and pool at her feet. Then she steps forward against him and frees his cock from his shorts.

She strokes him confidently, rolling her hips into him. Her mouth has left his and is focused on his neck. His head has fallen back, jaw dropped, eyes closed, and he still occasionally thrusts into her hand. She finds one of his hands and guides it to the waistband of her panties, encouraging him to remove them. When he doesn't, she tries to, one-handed, while attempting to align his cock at the same time.

"No, wait," he breathes, dropping his head forward to press his face against hers. "I want you in bed," he explains hotly into her ear. He tries to take a step in that direction.

"I want you everywhere," she bubbles in response.

"There's plenty of time for that," he growls back, still trying to move her towards the bedroom.

She glances at the clock on the microwave. "Elliot, we have four hours," she rationalizes.

"I didn't mean today," he breathes, taking another step toward the kitchen doorway.

Suddenly Olivia pulls back to study him. He just stands there and accepts the scrutiny, hiding nothing in his return gaze. "Shit," she finally observes, "you're serious, aren't you... about this."

"Yeah," he confirms hoarsely.

She turns away and folds her arms over her chest. "Jesus, Elliot, this isn't the way these things happen! Not this fast, not this suddenly—"

"'These things'?" he asks, now reaching down to tuck his dick back into his shorts. "I hope you mean relationships, because that's what I'm offering. That's the _only_ thing I'm offering. I'm not just in this for a quickie before work today—some quick kitchen countertop fuck. Let's be clear about that—"

"But twelve hours ago—shit, _six_ hours ago—we were just friends, coworkers. Partners. We'd never _touched_ each other—even once! And suddenly we're talking about... a relationship? No! This is _not_ the way things happen!"

"For us? Yeah, this is. This is _exactly_ the way things happen for us," he says adamantly, stepping closer to her. "It's always been this way between us: all or nothing. Always." He lets that sit for a moment. "Besides," he finally adds quietly, "even if we never acted on it, you can't tell me this hasn't been building."

She bites her lip and chances a look at him. Because he's right. Of course, he's right. It's just that she's not used to relationships, not used to men who actually know her, not used to believing them when they tell her they're there to stay. It's scary. It's scary because it's Elliot.

He can see her apprehension. He gives her the time and space she needs.

They stand there in the kitchen, half-dressed (she far less than he), just breathing for a while. Finally she closes her eyes and whispers, "I'm sorry."

He shifts towards her then reaches to cup her face and stroke her cheek with his thumb. "Hey," he whispers back. She meets his gaze. "I get it," he assures her softly.

Something flickers in her eyes and she reaches for his waistband. With a tug, she spurs him forward, then leads him out of the kitchen. In the hallway, she lets go and walks in front of him. Behind her, he removes his t-shirt and tosses it somewhere. At the entrance to her bedroom, she shimmies out of her panties, then heads directly for the bed. He lingers in the doorway until she has positioned herself and looks up at him expectantly. He drinks in the sight for some time. Then he pushes his briefs off his hips and strides over.

For a moment he just sits on the edge of the bed next to her, his hand on her neck as they watch each other. She runs her hand along his arm and down his side to his thigh.

"I do want this," she tells him quietly. "All of it."

He has never felt more overwhelmed in his life. He closes his eyes and almost shakes his head as he considers his profound love for her.

She breaks him from his reverie, though, when she leans forward and kisses him, her hand sliding easily from his thigh to his cock. He turns instantly and kneels over her, gently laying her back on the bed as he fumbles to reach a sheet to cover them with. Then he climbs between her legs and settles himself there, and they're both trembling. His lips latch onto her neck as he reaches down to make sure she's ready for him, then he slowly guides himself in, and they both expel long-held breaths as he enters her for the first time.


	3. Undone

It's not the frantic sex of teenagers, nor the passionate sex of the affair everyone assumed they'd been having for years; it's the clumsy, mid-morning, first-time sex of two nearly-fifty-somethings, and there's really very little going for it except the raw emotion that led them here.

There's no screaming, no keening, no shrieking of names or curses. It's mostly grunting and panting; his love-making was crafted over twenty years of not waking the children in the next room, and she only makes noise when she thinks her date needs it.

She gasps in surprise the first time he makes her come, driving his thumb against her as he lifts her hips and pushes deeper into her. It's only the fourth time in her life that another person has ever done it, and it is so startling that she can hardly keep her eyes open afterwards. Heavy-lidded, they seem to roll back in her head as he continues on, not letting her ride it down on her own.

When she recovers, she resumes flexing and grinding against him, and he comes shortly thereafter with a shudder and nearly immaculate silence. He collapses on top of her, and they both lie there breathing heavily, gasping for breath.

He's so exhausted that all he wants to do is roll over and go to sleep, but he's still inside her, and she's naked beneath him, and he wouldn't trade this moment for anything. His lips find her jaw and he kisses her wetly, reveling in the taste of that thin sheen of sweat. She reaches across herself to scrape her fingers through his short hair and pull him closer, and the phrase "post-coital haze" has never seemed more appropriate to her.

He's nuzzling her ear, and she sighs, and his hand slides up between them to palm her breast briefly before trailing back down her stomach until his fingers find the heat and dampness where they're still joined. With his mouth still on her neck and his limp cock still inside her, he works her clit with his deft fingers, rocking his pelvis slightly against hers until she comes again—brought there for the fifth time ever by someone else.

Her walls contract at the climax and literally push him out of her, and he, oblivious to how momentous this orgasm or the one before it was, simply shifts off of her to the side and holds her hip as his lips work their way up to hers. She accepts him with an open mouth and they lie there lazily kissing in what might just be the most tender moment the two have ever shared.

She finally breaks the kiss and rolls over with her back to him. He instinctively presses himself against her, and when she starts squirming a little, he misunderstands and simply pulls her with him farther onto his side of the bed, away from the wet spot on her side. She lies there with her eyes wide open, trying to process the enormity of what has just happened.

And she is not a cuddler.

Panic creeps in. This is a double-edged sword, she realizes too late. Because, on one hand, this is everything she ever wanted—or something damn close to it. It's great sex, it's someone in her personal life that she trusts implicitly, it might be a relationship. It's Elliot. More amazingly, it's Elliot in her bed. And at the same time, it is—or could be—the end of everything: of their careers, of their partnership, of self-preservation. What a fucking mess.

And, on top of it all, he made her come. Twice.

Elliot's arm is wrapped securely around her waist, his hand tucked between her breast and the mattress, and she can feel his warm dick and the scratch of his hair against her ass, and there's something indescribable about the feeling. There is something _so_ unnatural about it, but _so_ comforting—so _familiar_—that it doesn't even make sense to her. The moment is nothing less than surreal.

And she lets go.

For once, she gives herself over to it. Stops analyzing. Stops worrying. Breathes.

He wants to say something in the stillness, maybe profess his love again, or thank her for going here with him, but he's afraid of ruining what has become a comfortable silence, so he just tightens his grip on her and burrows down behind her.

Olivia has closed her eyes, and gradually, the partners' heartbeats fall into step, and so does their breathing, and before long, both of them are asleep again.

* * *

She is vaguely aware of him getting up at some point to use the bathroom. She rolls over while he's gone and folds into him when he returns, pressing her chest to his and tucking one leg between his. Other than this disruption, neither wakes until the afternoon.

"Oh shit," Olivia groans when she twists in Elliot's arms to see the clock. "Hey," she grumbles, half-awake, to Elliot as she lightly slaps his elbow. She groans again as she pulls herself out of his grip. Her body is aching, and she feels like absolute shit. "Get up," she mumbles, thumping his knee with the heel of her foot. He grunts in response and she drags herself to the edge of the bed. "It's after one, Elliot. You've gotta go home and... and change." She glances back at him, and she is totally blown away by her desire to kiss him. The craziest thing is that she suspects she's allowed to now, but despite that, and despite the fact she has never wanted to kiss anyone else as much as she wants to kiss him in this moment, she's reluctant to make the first move this morning. What if... he had changed his mind? What if he decided he only wanted a quick fuck after all? Olivia is fully awake now. "Elliot, get up," she says a little more coldly.

There is motion on the bed behind her. "I don't wanna get up," he groans dramatically, and when she turns to look at him, he is completely sprawled out in the bed. He turns his head to meet her gaze, and the sight of her brings a sweet smile to his face. "Good morning," he whispers.

Doubts fully obliterated, she smiles back at him. "Good morning," she responds before turning to crawl over to him. He sits up to meet her when she gets there, and he lets her kiss him.

He inhales deeply, perpetually on the verge of telling her he loves her.

"You should go," she repeats, sitting in front of him on the bed.

"I don't want to go," he whispers, taking her hand in his and threading their fingers together. He catches her eye, a wicked grin on his face, and leans forward to press his open mouth to her throat.

Her eyes close and with the hand he isn't holding, she reaches for him and holds his head in place. "I don't want you to, either," she admits, scratching her fingers along his scalp, "but you need to." Her hand slides to his shoulder.

He pulls back and smiles tightly at her. "I know." He squeezes her hand and releases it, then scoots to the edge of the bed. She also climbs off and then, unclothed and unashamed, heads for the bathroom. "See you soon," he says to her as he approaches her in the doorway.

"Yeah, okay," she agrees, and then he pecks her quickly on the lips and she disappears into the bathroom while he bends to start collecting his discarded clothing.

* * *

He arrives at work seventeen minutes after she does. He rounds the corner into the bullpen and sees her across the room, hunched over some file on her desk, and she looks like she's been there all day. When she sits up and rubs her eyes, she looks haunted and weary—as she often does by this time of day at work. He's a little surprised, maybe disappointed; deep down, he had always thought that he would be the one who could erase all her worry and pain, and that, similarly, when they finally slept together, she would afterwards look rested, refreshed—at peace—for the first time in years.

What he doesn't realize is that he, too, still looks as haggard as he always has. And that, no matter this morning's events—however much like a resolution that might have felt—it was too brief to completely unwind either of their bodies from the twelve years of tension that had brought them to that point. More than a decade of determined restraint is one hell of a precedent to overcome, and it was going to take a lot more than just this morning to fully resolve it all. Besides, today could only have offered but so much relief; whatever tension had unwound, the events had stirred something new inside of him, something that just couldn't wait to spring again.

When she finally pulls her thumbs from her eyes, she glances up and sees him. She smiles softly, and she looks less tired when she does that. "Hey," she offers quietly, not wanting to give the slightest sign of anything to their coworkers. She lifts her travel mug as she says it, indicating with the gesture that she noticed the coffee he had brewed for her on his way out of her apartment.

"Hey," he grunts in return like he might have on any other day, but he can't take his eyes off her, and there's a wolfish twinkle there that tells her he's not as indifferent as he sounds. He tosses his jacket on the back of his chair and goes to the coffeemaker to pour himself the last of what's there and start a new pot. Tepid coffee in hand, he returns to his seat. "What time did you get here?" he asks across their desks.

"Not long ago. Twenty, thirty minutes maybe."

He nods. "We got anything?"

She shakes her head. "Things seem pretty dead. Cragen's in a meeting, so I haven't been able to check in with him yet. I was just going over what I wrote last night—making sure it makes sense, you know?" she says with a smirk.

Elliot laughs, his fingers trailing over the rim of his coffee mug, and briefly glances at Fin and Munch, both of whom are busy with their own paperwork. He fixes his gaze on her. "You get any sleep last night?"

She flushes instantly and shoots her own glance towards Fin and Munch. She's about to ignore him completely when rationality kicks in and she realizes that, under any other circumstances, it's a perfectly normal question. "Some," she replies, trying to keep her voice light. She angles her head and rubs the back of her neck. "You?"

"Not much," he says, leaning as far back in his chair as he can. "I don't know," he muses. "When I'm the most tired, I just can't sleep."

She smiles faintly and nods, knowing the phenomenon well, but also knowing that they each slept for more than seven hours last night—collectively, of course, but it was still the most sleep in one night that either of them had gotten in a week or more.

He follows her lead and pulls out the files he finished last night, proofing them for careless errors only made possible by sleep deprivation.

_Damn, he's good_. As she watches him return to work, he almost has her second-guessing whether last night was real or just another dream. But the coffee that she didn't make herself is still warm through the plastic against her hand, and her muscles are still sore from recent overuse, and she had found one of his socks in the sheets when she stripped the bed before leaving for work. It strikes her that they are alarmingly good at acting like nothing happened. They play normal well. She imagines it probably comes from the twelve years of practice they've had, pretending to everyone, including themselves, that they felt nothing for each other. _And maybe_, she suddenly thinks, _maybe this could work_. They didn't discuss how to handle the matter with the Department—whether one would request a transfer or early retirement or what—and now she thinks maybe they don't have to. Maybe, if they're this good at concealing the truth, they won't have to declare a thing, and they'll be able to remain partners.

Just then, Cragen's door flies open. The captain from the 2-7 stalks out, turns abruptly, mumbles something to Cragen, then shakes his hand and leaves. Cragen saunters out. He surveys the bullpen then strolls over to Benson and Stabler. They both put down their pens and look up at him.

"What's up, Cap?" Olivia asks, rubbing her face.

Cragen eyes them both suspiciously. "I thought I told you to get some rest—"

"We did, we're fine," Olivia interjects.

"What time did you finally leave last night?" Cragen continues.

Elliot shrugs. "'Bout two," he answers, crossing his arms and leaning over his desk.

Cragen eyes the clock. It's nearly three. "Well you look like crap. Take another day."

"Captain—" Elliot protests, and he and Olivia share a brief, knowing glance.

Their CO has already turned around. He holds up a hand as he walks away. "Keep your phones on, I'll call you if we get something, but I don't need either of your tired asses in the office today. Now get out of here." The door to his office slams shut behind him, and in the distance, some desk clerk's phone rings.

Elliot's jaw is tight as he looks across his desk at his partner. "How do you like that," he mutters with a shake of his head. He's honestly considering staying despite Cragen's orders, and his pensive gaze drops again to the file on his desk.

"Well," Olivia tosses as she closes her folders and starts to pack up, "you do look like hell."

Suddenly incensed, Elliot fixes her with a glare. But her expression is smug, and it's clear that she's only pushing his buttons because she knows which ones to push. His anger ebbs. "You still look pretty beat yourself," he sniffs.

"Yeah," she grunts as she slides into her jacket, "I'm not arguing with another day off." She stands there for a moment, looking down at him. "Well? Are you staying, or are you leaving?"

He looks up at her, wondering if he'll ever _not_ look like hell, now that she has wrecked him. "Okay, fine, I'm leaving," he breathes. He caps his pen, pushes himself away from his desk, and swallows the rest of his coffee. Standing, he closes the folders on his desk and leaves them there. "Happy?" he asks his partner as he swings his jacket on.

She laughs in response and heads for the elevators. "Come on," she says lightly. "You can drive me home." She can't see the show he makes of dropping his shoulders and rolling his eyes behind her.

"Never cut a break, can ya, Stabler?" Fin laughs from across the room.

Elliot snorts at the needling for Fin's benefit, but hurries to catch up to Olivia in the hallway. He leans in close as they wait for the elevator. "You realize I might just look _more_ tired tomorrow?" he whispers in her ear, hoping to throw her off with his ravenous insinuations.

"Mm. I hope so," she says as the doors ding open, and it's official: she will be the death of him. She steps into the car ahead of him, leaving him standing stupidly in the hall. Her eyes are bright and mischievous as she beckons him in. "Hurry up, Stabler. I need to get home."

Once he regains his senses, he lurches forward to join her, and the elevator doors close behind him.

-_fin_-

* * *

**A/N: Thanks for reading. Like I said at the outset, this was my first attempt at adult content, so... thanks for bearing with me. Also, for those of you who have been waiting a week for this installment, I apologize for the delay.**

**I appreciate all comments, so don't be shy. =]**


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